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Monday, September 27, 2010

Whew, September has been quite a month. With the start of our homeschool year, I wasn't able to read as much as I normally do. Since I am out of town I am only posting pictures of books I plan to start on when I get home.

Friday, September 10, 2010

Book Description:
Bestselling authors Bob and Emilie Barnes are a couple committed to encouraging and inspiring others to build their families on a foundation of kindness and faith. With that caring goal in mind and biblical wisdom at heart, they present their best tips, ideas, and examples to help parents guide children of any age to:

-become better listeners and communicators with peers and adults
-reflect a compassionate and helping heart for others
-experience confidence in social situations
-show respect for God and others through actions and words
-display daily manners at the table, on the phone, at school, and anywhere

Filled with practical advice, this Barnes offering will strengthen parents, children, and families as they discover together how good manners make life more enjoyable while reflecting the love of God to others.

Good Manners for Today's Kids: Teaching Your Child the Right Things to Say and Dois divided into six sections.The beginning of each section is directed tot he parent along with afamily activity. The rest of the section is to read aloud or read by kids or shared together as a family. I found this book gave me food for thought and helped me think of ideas to help in laying down good manners. I probably won't use the read aloud portions since I don't think my kids will enjoy it. One frustration I had is that some of the manner ideas given seemed to be put in the different sections randomly. Overall, I found this a great resource to help spark some ideas that we will work on together.

I learned about The Dales Series while going through book donations for the Friend's store that I am a contractor for. The cover gave it the recommendation as "the James Herriot of schools...". That was all I needed to start reading this series and I can't even begin to explain how much I enjoyed it. It was refreshing to read books filled with wonderful description of the land and people, while telling his story.

Gervase Phinn immediately draws you into the Dales as he tells his experiences as a school inspector. He gives fascinating and hilarious descriptions of his experiences with his co-workers, neighbors, teachers and students. I looked forward to each book and felt a little disappointed when I came to the end.

If you are tired of all the memoirs being written lately that only focus on me, me, me, I highly recommend you look up The Dales series and give it a read--you will not be disappointed!